Love Life in it's fullness; it knoweth no decay. ---J. Krishnamurti
What is beauty? And what has beauty to do with religion? I would like to suggest that life is beauty. There is beauty in all forms of life---in the large leaf of the banana tree and in the delicate tracery of the fern. Beauty is everywhere.
Every design in Nature is exquisite---not only the designs and patterns of plants, but all other forms and designs.
When observed closely, a little grain of sand, the wing of an insect, a tongue of flame---all these ravish the heart.
There is also beauty in movement---the flight of birds, the fall of water, the stately movement of the elephant, and deer bounding in the forest tell us of life. Then there is the beauty of character. There is beauty in each special quality which distinguishes every individual from all others. There is beauty of mind too---mind soaring heavenwards, examining creation, reaching understanding. There is also beauty in silence and in sound. So life is beauty. Many know the striking verse (II.29) in the Bhagavad Gita which Annie Besant translated as follows:
As marvelous one regardeth him; as marvelous another speaketh thereof; as marvelous another heareth thereof; yet having heard, none indeed understandeth.
All life is beauty for “eyes that can see.” But the fact is our eyes do not see for they are not in touch with the seer. What we think the eyes see is not seen by the eyes; it is the Self which sees through the eyes. What is heard is not heard by the ears; it is heard by the Self. This is not the self we think about, which we picture to ourselves as: this is me, I am this, I am not like that.
What we can see of ourselves is never the Self. The Self is the pure subject, the seer who cannot be seen, deep within. It enables us to see, to hear, to know and to sense beauty.
To be human means responding to beauty. The response may be to the beauty of colors and forms, to the beauty of sound, aspects of Nature, to the fine use of words, or to beauty of thought and character---in fact, to beauty of any kind. This response is a distinct quality of the human consciousness.
The response to beauty transmutes consciousness each time. When we see the sunlight falling on leaves, or feel the beauty of a quiet evening, something opens up within us. There is a feeling of release and of delight, for beauty liberates us from the constrictions we have put upon ourselves. It puts us into contact with the Self, that deeper nature within which is the pure subject, which cannot be seen or heard, but which is awareness.
Beauty is a bridge between that Self and the essence of that in which beauty is seen.
That Self, the immortal Self, is not personal. It is not the image we make of ourselves. Deeper within is the seer who is universal; and the experience of beauty transports us towards the universal.
All that we recognize as beautiful opens a way to the sacred and holy, because they are manifested fragments of Divine Truths. Hugh l’Anson Fausset observes:
By deeply contemplating the spiritual vision of those who have seen celestial beauty, we can discover the great reality to which we belong and participate in its truth and mystery.
Hence the Upanishads advise: learn to look, listen, reflect, enter yourself and meditate, for thus is the universal spirit or consciousness known.
In more recent years, Krishnamurti urged the people who heard him to observe and listen! Truth is kept open by all forms of beauty.
Beauty is Order. Hence, a feeling of holiness comes from contemplating the natural order. There is awesome beauty in the orderly progression of the stars and the growth of all things according to their gown nature. There is great beauty in that, in that order not of our making. It brings us a sense of confidence that all will be well. It tells us that there is justice at all times, because the heavenly order rules the universe.
When we sit quietly at sometime and watch the sea, or the sky, or the moon and stars, we experience space and a feeling of timelessness. In that, there is great beauty. It changes, at least for a time, not only our psyche, but even the condition of the body.
When there is less dross to obstruct the light, which is the case when consciousness is on the whole innocent, beauty is felt more deeply. When the consciousness is encrusted by crude thoughts, preconceptions and prejudices, life seems stale and arid. Innocence, whether that of a child, an animal, or a simple person, is an adjunct to beauty, and in that innocence is also virtue.
True virtue is the beauty of the divine light radiating from within.
So an excellent artist, or an outstanding poet is not necessarily a religious person. The words of a song or a theme or a dance do not make art religious.
To be truly religious, one must relinquish the desire to be in the finite state, in an identifiable form, and flow into the beauty of the universal.
Without sensitivity to the universal, we may be engaged not only in empty ritualism, but also in empty forms of art---technically excellent forms which do not contain the essence of art and therefore lack the religious quality.
The principle of beauty cannot be grasped as long as the mind is polluted by self-activity and desire. Only when we become inwardly free of greed to get somewhere, obtain something, be somebody---does virtue begin to flower in our hearts. Then we have a vision of wholeness,* of life in its richness, which is true religion.
Inner beauty is virtue, which expresses itself in the qualities we mentioned, such as loftiness of spirit, fearlessness and humility. For virtue to be, all that is superfluous must be removed. As the sculptor chisels away the marble and the rock to reveal a form of beauty, we have to chisel away the accretion in our own nature, until emotions and thoughts, in fact everything within, is pure innocent.
This, Krishnamurti described as austerity. He says austerity is “the simplicity of the mind that is purged of all conflict, that is not caught in the fire of desire, even the desire for the highest. Without this austerity there can be no love.”
To come to beauty that is love, perhaps we must begin with universal sympathy. The religion of beauty is the way to that purity and harmony with all, which is virtue and which is love. With a silent mind, when the heart is opened to the great ocean of life, with all its beauty, no outer religion is necessary.
Source: The Theosophist, February 1998. Theosophical Publishing House, Adyar, Chennai 600 020 India.
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* Holiness is derived from the Anglo-Saxon word halig which signifies wholeness or a state of perfect health (wellness, wholeness).
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Quotes & Poetries to Reflect Upon:
Son of mine, says the voice, all life is a song, even when most hidden in pain.
By sorrow is the way to union carved.
Clara M. Codd
Trust yourself to Life
Life is not as idle ore, but iron dug from central gloom, and heated hot
With burning fears and dipped in baths of hissing tears to shape and use.
Alfred Tennyson
Love not the shapely branch, nor place its image alone in thy heart. It dieth away.
Love the whole tree, then shalt thou love the shapely branch, the tender and the withered leaf, the shy bud and the full-blown flower, the falling petal and the dancing light, the splendid shadow of full love. Ah, love life in its fullness! It knoweth no decay.
Jiddu Krishnamurti
In everything give thanks, for this is the will of God for you in Christ Jesus.
Paul to the Romans
